Benediction (30 days in the asylum) | Paulette Claire Turcotte

There is a secret medicine given only to those who hurt so hard they cannot hope. —Rumi

1. somewhere a woman,
   somewhere
2. you were intoxicated with the light from a thousand brilliant suns
   but the lights were out where I came from
3. my heart was pounding as I turned to leave
   listen, I said, I break like tinder
4. you loved my specific and colourful madness
   the touch of my fingertips on your cheek
5. look now, no regrets
6. crows feed on my grief
   I am petrified wood
7. vestiges of human frailty stalk me
   something alien breathes in me
8. the planets still orbit the around the sun
9. I beseech the saints,
   mourn prophets 
 light candles to the Blessed Virgin
10. I am the disappeared
    inventing my own city
    the streets and I
    fronting on insanity
11. I am a muscle, an eel, a fish, 
 I am a heart, a woman
12. the lunatic forum for the marginalized
13. I am petrified wood
14. I run naked into the streets
15. there were too many nights like this you said
16. now the saints whisper,
    asking me to believe.
17. the bite of the dark
 the cold of the walls
    the corpses stacked along the way
18. naked, I wander the hallways
    looking for comfort
    signs mistaken for wonders
    the pity beyond all telling
19. we were bruised and we were healed
    I wrote letters from the asylum 
 an act of contrition is a lonely sacrifice
20. the voices taunted me from behind the walls
 I was clothed by the good sisters,
    dreamed into being by their persistent prayers
21. letters, words, proof that I’m here,
 I exist
22. I lie down with my dreams and the stars,
    with my head at the roots
    of that one tree you see there
23. the birds are about.
24. I can smell the loam.
25. am I too late?
26. what is the colour of hope?
27. I dream of a changeling
    animal and divine
28. I am holding out for the sacred medicine.
29. sometimes your desires are all that’s left after the storm
30. still, it’s hard, wrestling with a stone.